Decision-making framework for the scheduling of cleaning/maintenance tasks in continuous parallel lines with time-decreasing performance

摘要

The efficiency of equipment units decreases depending on the time they have been operating due to fouling, formation of subproducts, decay of conversion etc. Therefore, equipment maintenance and/or cleaning is periodically required to restore the original conditions that allow higher productivity rates. This poses a trade-off between the cost of equipment shutdown and the resulting productivity improvement. The problem of determining the maintenance frequency and the timing of the specific tasks in each equipment unit is studied a hierarchical way (planing and scheduling). A general approach is first introduced and next the implementation is presented. The solution approach proposed is based on a practical decision-making framework allowing both, the user driven what if analysis and the optimisation carried out by plugged modules. Finally, an example is shown and the results are discussed.